Posts Tagged ‘MaST’

The discussion at our last MaST meeting about parallel axes of reflections lead me to think about this a lot. And it wasn’t until I sat down with some paper and drew things that I could see it clearly.

At the last meeting, we looked into exploring reflection using a skipping rope and children mirroring each others movements. We looked at reflecting points, with people moving freely and easily with this concept.

We moved on to creating a triangle with three people holding hands. The reflection of this object was made simple by each of the adults matching themselves to someone on the imaging side, each movement was then copied by the imagers so that each point remained the same distance from the axis of reflection.

The major sticking point was when parallel axes of reflection were introduced. We couldn’t agree on how things should be. I actually think, on reflection (pun fully intended) that we got it right straight away and all the discussion only served to confuse things even more.

In the diagram below, the purple line is Reflection Axis 1, the black line is Reflection Axis 2. The lines are parallel, that is lines that do not intersect or meet.

Also, the object is always on the far left, image 1 is middle and image 2 is on the right.

The red lines show the distance between the object and image 1. The blue lines show the distance between image 1 and image 2.

The second diagram shows what has happened after the object has been moved further to the right, away from the first axis of reflection.

As the changes in the coloured lines show, as the object is moved further from reflection axis 1, object 1 moves further away – the length of the red line has increased. As the 1st image moves closer to the 2nd axis of reflection, the 2nd image moves closer to the 2nd reflection line – the length of the blue line has decreased.

Furthermore, the movement of the 2nd image related to the object is the same effect as translation.

Tomorrow, I work with Year 3, completing some of the activities that were so successful with Year 6. I plan to introduce the session with a secret construction, along similar lines to the one made at the start of last Wednesday’s lesson with Year 6 – a simple house like structure using only a couple of colours. Hopefully this will be at a reasonable level for them to work securely.

After this, I’m moving outside with them to work in circles. I will be having 13 children, more than I would like – so I will have a group of 6 and a group of 7. Hopefully these groups won’t be too small for a successful string challenge – I can always combine them into a group of 10 with a few onlookers and rotate the children as and when so everyone gets an opportunity to be in the circle. I am hoping for dry weather – standing up and lowering the string was harder than I thought for the 6s and so if they were sat on the floor, it would help a lot.

My main concern is that I haven’t worked with children of this age for a long while now…

I attended the first meeting of many over the next two years as I begin my professional journey to a richer, greener, hopefully much improved, teaching field. I have many ideas about what I would like to achieve from this course – specific, actual targets aren’t something I’ve thought about. Yet.

I know where I want my career to go eventually in that I’d like to be someone who is a creative teacher of maths, and other subjects. I want to be known by the people I work with as someone they can mine for ideas or suggestions. I have plenty of ambition, plenty of drive, I’m willing to try anything at least once if I think it will help my pupils get a richer educational experience – although I’m slightly skeptical before I try something without knowing it’s worked elsewhere. This reason is precisely why I’m a follower of many teaching professionals on Twitter, why I spend time reading all kinds of educational web sites and forums.

Anyway, on with the course. The idea behind the Mathematics Specialist Teacher role is to become a “Mathematics Champion”. Someone who is, according to the course handbook:

…a confident and competent mathematician who can inspire children and teachers and be truly regarded as a Champion of Mathematics in the schools in which they work.

The initial development of this role was outlined in the 2008 Williams Report (Independent Review of Mathematics Teaching in Early Years Settings and Primary Schools – WMR Final Report). Recommendation 3 of which states:

There should be at least one Mathematics Specialist in each primary school, in post within 10 years, with deep mathematical subject and pedagogical knowledge, making appropriate arrangements for small and rural schools. Implementation should commence in 2009 and be targeted initially to maximise impact on standards and to narrow attainment gaps.

Now, this is likely to go out of the window in the future as the admittedly much needed money saving cuts are put in place by the current government. Indeed, funding is in the air for future cohorts. I am part of the second such cohort in Kirklees, a member of a group of 40 individuals – but Calderdale will only have one cohort, consisting of just 10 people as their second cohort funding was not approved.